


Mizuchi and Ryujin

by Dinkdidnothingwrong



Category: Scott Pilgrim (Comics), Scott Pilgrim - All Media Types, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Brotherly Angst, Brotherly Love, Fake Character Death, No Incest, Post-Canon, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:13:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29392491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dinkdidnothingwrong/pseuds/Dinkdidnothingwrong
Summary: When Ken disappears into arcade coins, Kyle Katayanagi doesn't know how to cope with the presumed death of his twin.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 1





	Mizuchi and Ryujin

"KEN!" The point counter grew to 6000, but Kyle Katayanagi still stood, or kneeled rather, the change remains of his beloved twin slipping through his fingers. Scott Pilgrim just dashed past him, leaving Kyle to sit in the carnage, the only sign of Ken his red tank top sitting among the wrecked Ninth Circle stage. "KEN!!!"

"Hey, uh, I know it's not exactly great of me to call, but, um...I just wanted to make sure you're okay after what happened-" Kyle just skipped past Stephen's message.He was very much not okay. He stood in a gross white t-shirt and boxers, soda dripping down his chin as he drank straight out of the two liter. His sound boards were scattered across the room in complete disarray, robotic parts with them, a crowning jewel of an answering machine filling up with calls from his parents and friends. Kyle didn't pick any of them up of course. How could he? What was he supposed to do? Break down to his parents? Send Stephen back a half hearted reply on how he was handling it as well as he could? Try to talk about business to his producer? 

No. 

No way. 

Kyle kicked the mess under their double colored couch (Ken had demanded they get it, and constantly switch which side they sat on while insisting to guests they were very anal about who sat where) and headed into their bedroom. There was only one in the entire apartment, and sure, they could've gotten one that had two, but this one had a studio space and that meant one bedroom only. Not that they cared. They had shared throughout most of their childhood. Kyle stared at the part of the bedroom Ken had picked as his own (Ken actually was pretty anal about whose side was whose) and felt his chest constrict. Softly, he brushed his hands over the threwn about sheets. Crumbling, Kyle sobbed, tears soaking the sheets as he screamed for his brother. He slammed his fists into the mattress till his sobs had become nothing more than quiet whimpers. Then, silently, as if nothing had ever happened, Kyle pulled the sheets off the bed. He bundled them up and put them in his own laundry, took the music competition awards off the shelf in one swipe of his arm, practically ripped the college diploma off the wall.

By the time Kyle had finished stripping the right side of the room bare, no one would have ever been able to tell someone else had ever lived there. But more important, Kyle couldn't tell Ken had.

Knock Knock

Kyle pulled open the door and froze. Mr and Mrs Katayanagi entered hesitantly, stepping over soda cans and the ever more complex web of interconnected launch pads and amps. "Um…" Isao mumbled, looking around the room for anything comforting. But all she could find was her technically older son, in ratty basketball shorts and socks. "None of us have been taking this well but I can't imagine…" She reached for him, but Kyle flinched and stepped back. Isao withdrew, gripping her husband's arm. 

"Kyle please, we just want to help." Kenji said, worry and grief tracing his voice. To lose one son, and see the poor state of the other. "We know...at least, we're going through this too-"

"Please." Kyle practically spit.

"We just-"

"I already cleaned it all up! Got it all out of sight! That's the hard part isn't it?"

"You know it's not that simple."

"Sure it is! And after the funeral-" Kyle stopped. It was the first time he'd said it out loud. Funeral. For someone who was dead.

Ken Katayanagi was dead.

"And after the funeral…." He muttered, his mother's soft hands cupping his face. It was so gentle, so comforting, but this touch meant that his brother was gone, and he couldn't take it. He removed her hands. "Get out."

"Kyle-"

"Get out!" He squeezed his eyes shut, pained stares from his parents bearing down on him anyway. 

"We are grieving just as much as you are!" Isao snapped. 

"Like hell! You could never understand what we had! You have no idea the things we were capable of, what we went through together!" He yelled.

"If this is about that Ramona girl-" Kyle saw red. Physically shoving his parents, he forced them out the apartment and slammed the door.

"STAY AWAY FROM ME!" 

"Kyle!" Isao went to pull on the door handle, but her husband stopped her. 

"There's nothing we can do for him right now. Come on."

Kyle sat among his sea of wires, boards, tables and pads pumping out sound into every empty corner of the room. Nothing was free from the deep basses and break neck beat, notes clashing and bending over each other in a musical car crash that wailed into the night from his open balcony doors. On other nights, people would've stopped below the twins studio, listening to tracks early in concept or hearing them put the finishing touches on one soon to release. But tonight no one stopped, most picking up their pace to escape the noise. It was the sound of the end, and as Kyle held the kitchen knife to his chest, he wondered about the baffled face of Canadian police when they arrived. A disgusting suicide surrounded by the echoing rhythm of pain, his last few moments immortalized in the greatest piece of art this dumb country had ever seen. Of course, Kyle couldn't appreciate such things. All he wanted to do was slam the knife into his heart and see his brother again. Make up some fake story about Scott and a round two if he could, and fall back into his stride with him, like a puzzle momentarily ripped apart only to be rebuilt stronger. He tried to rationalize it. To think about samurai and honor, and how dare he to live after being crushed by such a weakling like Pilgrim. But he knew better. As much as Kyle wanted to think otherwise, he simply couldn't live in a world without his brother. He was the reason he made an effort to stay in the family, the reason he made music, the reason he kept going this long and hadn't just done this in high school. Without Ken, Kyle saw nothing that tied him to this world. He steadied the knife parallel to his throat, and breathed in hard. 

"Kyle! They finally let me out of the hospital, and-" Ken threw open the door, both freezing at the sight of each other. "Kyle?" The knife clattered to the floor, Kyle's hands shaking as he stared at the twin he had thought dead mere seconds before. Immediately Ken dropped his bag and rushed over, kicking the knife out of reach and wrapping his arms around his brother. "It's okay, it's okay."

"You're back."

"Yeah." He whispered.

"You're back!" Kyle broke down sobbing into his brother's shoulder. He cried for the good half of an hour, Ken crying right along with him. "I didn't know what to do...I know I shouldn't have, but I just couldn't imagine a world without-" Ken just shushed him. 

And just like that, the Katayanagi twins were reunited. As Ken went to fetch the mini pizzas he had bought on his way over, his foot hit one of the laptops and the song switched to the lullaby version of Twin Dragons he had been working on coming up on their battle with Scott. It pulled at Kyle, the adrenaline petering out of his veins and sleep weighing down his eyelids. Soon enough his head rested on Ken's shoulder, and it wasn't too long before he too felt the last few days wearing him down. 

The twins drifted off, heads resting on top of one another. In that moment, their heartbeats pulsed in synch, and nothing could ever tear them apart again.


End file.
